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Published Sunday, July 31, 2005 by seanlmccarthy | E-mail this post

TWO VIEWS ON LOCAL PAYOLA: I ran into former colleague Dean Johnson the other night, and both of us were both a bit perturbed at what's happened to Boston media coverage in the past couple of months. Dean has left. Our own Greg Gatlin got a promotion, and subsequently, we don't have anyone devoted full-time to media criticism. Mark Jurkowitz left the Globe, or did he (judging from his stuff in the Phoenix, he hasn't completely figured out where his loyalties lie just yet). So when the latest radio payola lawsuit settlement news came out of New York City, I wondered how we'd get at the local angles. Thankfully, my pals in the Inside Track read the memos and tracked down the locals. But the Globe, a couple of days later, interestingly published a story that pretended that none of that happened. Very, very odd. Read the two stories and commence the head-shaking.

Boston Herald's Inside Track on Thursday: Payola scandal no music to local stations' ears
Boston Globe on Saturday: Local stations avoid 'pay for play' scandal